


The Evil of Innocence

by Saheeba



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, BUT NO SEX UNTIL AFTER TIME SKIP, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Ben Solo is a Mess, Ben is 23, Canon Age Difference, Character Development, Deconstruction Junction, Dubious Consent, Dubious Ethics, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, I need a hug, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Loss of Virginity, Mutual Pining, OT Needs A Dressing Down, Obsessive Behavior, Possessive Behavior, Problematic Relationships, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rey Needs A Hug, Rey is 13 in the beginning, Rey is a Mess (Star Wars), Slow Burn, Snoke Being a Dick (Star Wars), Some Underage Stuff, Symbolism (TM), The original trio will be called out on their bs, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings, fucked up family, lol if I can even make it to the end, pseudo sibling rivalry, sorta - Freeform, still problematic, time skip
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:21:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27140338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saheeba/pseuds/Saheeba
Summary: After harsh beginnings life is finally going well for thirteen year old foster kid Rey. She’s got a good guardian who, in a miraculous coincidence, is also friends with two of Rey’s childhood idols, Han Solo and Leia Organa. Much to her joy, the couple embrace the orphan like a daughter, a role she eagerly disappears into.But one summer day, just as things seem better than ever, reality comes crashing down on them when Han and Leia’s wayward son, Ben, unexpectedly returns for a visit. Despite clashing immediately the foster kid and the Solo heir forge an increasingly complex tie of mutual loneliness, interest, rivalry, resentment, joy - and unsettling attraction, before circumstances tear them apart.Years later Rey encounters Kylo Ren, formerly Ben Solo, and once again becomes drawn into the Solo-Organa-Skywalker family orbit. And this time there is nothing standing in the way of the frightening pull between them.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 22
Kudos: 51





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Some quick notes: The First Order is kind of a secret society embedded within corporate power in this universe. Sort of cult like, but it doesn't really matter since the main focus really is the romance. Expect some deconstruction of the canon characters sprinkled throughout this fic (my way of coping with TROS). I imagine Luke as a sort of Carl Sagan figure in this, while Leia is like a rich liberal philanthropist politician who works entirely within the system and Han is an old heartthrob race-car driver who owns and a luxury airline. Basically, well-meaning shitty neoliberal Boomers lol. This will be a slow burn but I'll try to not make it feel too glacial. Please heed the warning tags. And if you have any questions let me know by reviewing ;P
> 
> First chappie has no Ben sorry. This is about establishing Rey and her circumstances first. He'll be in the second one I promise. Apologies for any errors in advance, I have no beta lol.

* * *

Rey’s second summer in Takodana, and she could tell already that it would be hotter than the last, though nothing compared to the miserable heat that she had grown up with in Jakku.

  
  


Still sleepy, the new wave of heat drugging her senses, Rey lay in her bed that morning, blinking peacefully up at the glow in the dark star stick-ons tacked to the ceiling. Maybe the childish display couldn’t compare to the stark beauty of the real stars that roofed her in at the junkyard, uninhibited by city lights, but they were all the more sweeter for they were closer, less vast and she lay in a warm bed, not the dilapidated hood of an abandoned car because Unkar Plutt refused to get her a mattress. As the days passed, the downsides of leaving Jakku had finally begun to shrink in her mind. Now, almost a year out from being placed in the foster home of Maz Kanata, Rey felt something resembling the contented happiness she’d always craved.

  
  


Yawning, the thirteen year old resisted the lulling pull of the early June heat, swung her legs out of bed and stretched.

  
  


“Oh no,” she whispered when she saw the time on her nightstand, dashing to the bathroom in haste. She really, really should skip the shower but she can’t help herself. A human water lily, Maz liked to call her. Rey had looked up water lilies. They floated gracefully in an enviable way that her own swimming skills lacked. They also came from the mud, a metaphor that hit a little too close to home. But water lilies are beautiful and she knew that was what Maz meant and that made her happy.

  
  


Rey hurried through an abbreviated routine, slathering on her peach scented body wash and shampoo, then after the brief rinse jammed her tooth brush across her gooey pink gums. Knowing at any minute Han could arrive. The middle-aged scoundrel wasn’t known for his timeliness but when it was least convenient he had a knack for arriving right on the dot, like some cosmic joke. “Rey!” called a craggy old voice. Rey stuck her head out the bathroom doorway, fiddling with her lank brown hair to work them into her ‘signature’ (Leia’s description) three buns. “Is he here?” Rey yelled back. 

  
  


“I’m old and downstairs, not deaf and across a canyon,” her foster guardian griped good-naturedly. “No, he’s not. I just wanted to make sure you were up.”

  
  


“I am,” she assured her, crossing back to her bedroom, first throwing on her swimsuit, then simple shorts and a T-shirt, and skip-running her way down to the kitchen dining table. There, Maz bustled about, in her element, preparing her breakfast, setting the table with a hearty plate of toast and jam with scramble. She really shouldn’t...but Rey was loathed to skip breakfast too. “Excited?” Maz queried, taking in her ward’s eager demeanor. Rey grinned. “Yeah, Han’s taking me to Nymeve Lake. He says I’m ready to swim in an actual lake now.” 

“And are you?” asked Maz, suspiciously.

“Um.” Truthfully no. She had only ever waded in the shallow end of the Organa-Solo mansion’s swimming pool and that was with embarrassing floaties keeping her adrift. “I’ll be wearing a life jacket,” she averred. “And Leia’s gonna meet us there.” Her guardian relaxed. Leia was too responsible to let any accidental drowning happen on her watch. Not that she didn’t trust Han. After all, she had been the one to cajole him into spending time with Rey in the first place. 

Long time friends, she’d introduced Han to Rey last year after the girl first came to live with her. Rey had been having trouble adjusting and Han provided a solution. Like everyone else in the country, Rey knew of Han Solo. Record setting race car driver turned international rescue worker turned successful airline owner, his life’s accomplishments were the stuff of legends, right up there with Leia Organa and Luke Skywalker. Sometimes, in between the monotonous grind of her shifts in the junkyard, Rey would climb into one of the defunct vehicles and pretend she was Han Solo himself, racing the Millenium Falcon to rescue victims from an imagined flood or set a new world record. 

Then there was the woman he married. Leia Organa could never be described as “his wife”. Rather, Han was Leia’s husband. Leia Organa, the socialite, the senator, the one woman army against corruption and Wall Street despite hailing from not one, but two old money dynasties. A role model for girls everywhere.

The strategy paid off: when Maz told Rey that her childhood hero was practically their next door neighbor she was immediately dazzled, and soon after they met, Rey was spending hours with Han, to his gruff, bashful enjoyment, on miscellaneous projects and adventures. Rey’s skill with mechanics, learned from hardworn experience, served as a bonding point for both of them. She met Leia not long after and the rest was history. A crotchety ex-racecar daredevil, a slivering blue blooded U.N. Council Member, and a thirteen year old foster kid with a knack for fixing things. A strange trio if there ever was one, but if it seemed strange to an outsider it made sense to Rey. 

Turned out she had rushed for nothing. It was stretching into over an hour past Han’s agreed arrival time and still no sign of him. Even for Han that was pushing it. No answer on his cell. Han always kept his promises, by the scruff of the neck if need be. And Rey took promises very seriously. 

She was starting to get a serious case of the fidgets by the time he finally pulled up in his signature Chevrolet Astro that he refused to part with, and the attached yacht in tow. _His hippie van_ , Rey liked to call it (anachronistically so Han pointed out). Rey wrenched the door open before he could reach it. “What took you so long?” she pouted. Han chuckled in rueful overtones of apology and already Rey felt her annoyance softening under the familiar fatherly charm. “Sorry, kiddo. Some stuff came up.” He patted her head, careful to avoid the three bun hairdo she pinned up everyday. “You know how it is…”

No, she certainly did not “know how it is”, but Han didn’t need to know that. The orphan vaguely knew that Han had a life outside of his partial residency in Takodana and the tales of adventure from his youth but she didn’t know much about it, nor wanted to. _It’s enough that he’s here_ , she thought. “I got some crummy news though. Leia won’t be able to make it to the lake today.” 

“What? Why not?” she questioned, more than a little disappointed.Han ran a hand through his bristly grey hair. He appeared old at that moment. “Like I said, stuff came up...She had to fly out to Coruscant unexpectedly. She’s real sorry, kid. But I got some good news. Guess who’s coming in her stead?” 

As if on cue, the horn honked from the parked Chevrolet and a large hirsute arm emerged from the passenger window, sending a jovial wave their way. “Chewie!” the teen squealed.

“Alright, alright keep it down will you? If Maz hears he’s around she’ll never let us go,” Han grumbled. 

* * *

  
  


Nymeve Lake shone a glittering black-green in the high noon sun, the little white caps like the jagged edges of an obsidian flint. The water was calm, with only light winds whipping at its lacquered surface. The forest encompassed it like an encrusted jewel and the coniferous scent lent an extra refreshing air to their excursion. Rey’s mouth popped open at the sight. Takodana township was famous for its natural beauty but this was the first time Rey had seen so many acres of uninterrupted forests. “I never knew there was this much green in the whole world,” she sighed as the van pulled into the launch. Her eyes fell to the lake. “Or this much water!”

By the time they set sail the lake was already dotted with other vessels taking advantage of its ample waters and peoples crowding the shore. Some were college aged partiers stripping to the near nude and diving into the cool waters with chaotic hoots. Others were couples or individuals looking for a good fishing spot. But most were families. A mom, a pop and some kids. Some with grannies and grandpas or a dog too. 

Rey tried not to look at them too hard. Just like she tried not to stare at the various clans of relatives that dined at Maz’s Kanata Kastle Pizzeria. Besides, it didn’t bother her as much now as it used to because…The young teen turned her hazel eyes back to Han, who was carefully steering the boat into deeper waters with that an endearing look of frustrated concentration that he applied to everything, and her heart filled with a peculiar sort of happiness. Like a color in drawing, only half finished, but with the satisfaction of seeing you colored within the lines. _This is enough._

The motor switched off. They had reached almost the precise epicenter of this particular basin of Nymeve Lake. “So” Han turned to them, “what do ya wanna do first? Fish or swim?” 

Rey hesitated. “Fishing.” She’s still uncertain about her swimming skills. “Fishing,” Chewie seconded. “Oh come on,” Han teased, accurately guessing the reason behind Rey’s reticence. “You’re not scared of the water, are ya? I bet you can swim like a mermaid by now.” Han didn’t appreciate the agony of reluctance. He had spent his life plunging headlong into whatever. Rip the band aid off and inject the needle already. 

“Ha ha,” Rey scoffed. 

Once they had set their bait, the three clambered back, and sat on the rear stoop of the vessel to cast their lines. Time passed quaintly with the usual chatter until Chewie turned to her. “How’s school?” he asked through his thick but unplaceable accent. Han had told her that his best friend hailed from Slovenia, though on another occasion Leia had said he was Slovakian. Maz claimed he was Romanian. Wherever and whoever he came from, all agreed it was quite a feat for the thirteen year old to be able to understand him when almost no one else could. “It’s like a rare gift,” Han had chuckled.

“School ended last Thursday,” Rey informed him, fiddling with her life jacket. “They let us eat pizza on the last day. I made sure my class ordered from Kanata Kastle.” Chewie smiled. “I bet Maz hated you for that. Making enough food for a class of teenagers is not easy.” 

Rey giggled. “Nah, she was grateful for the business.” 

“If there’s one thing Maz loves more than anything,” Han mused, “it’s good business.” 

“You mean money,” Rey corrected. Han grinned back at her. “You’re catching on, kid. My advice to you when you become an adult: find a way to make the most money with the least amount of ‘business’ you have to conduct. A bit of the Solo-Skywalker family wisdom passed on to you.”

“What, you mean like pairing up with my brother-in-law to start a luxury airline?”

“Exactly.”

“But you also rescued people, Han,” Rey pointed out. “Not to mention Leia’s role in the senate and now the U.N., or Luke Skywalker’s _Star Finder_ which is the most watched educational T.V. series in the English language -” 

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Han waved her off in modesty, embarrassed but with an underlying anxiety that Rey missed. She got excited when she remembered all that the famed trio were. They had been part of the pantheon of people’s childhoods. She was proud to be Han and Leia’s - acquaintance. She hadn’t met Luke yet, but Rey already felt she knew the Nobel Prize winning aerospace engineer through his relatives and through his educational shows that she watched whenever she had the chance. 

Things went silent. Han kept a distracted vigil on the bobber nodding in the water. Rey hummed the theme to _Star Finder._ And much to her chagrin, Chewie continued his questions about school. “Any of your friends planning to get together over the summer?” Rey resumed fiddling with her life jacket. “Yeah, maybe,” she replied in forced cheerfulness, shrugging off her life jacket just for something to do. Being asked about school was embarrassing. Luckily Chewie didn’t pursue it further. Rey had an idea about what point he ultimately wanted to make: _If you have any friends you wanna bring over, feel free_. 

It had been an entire school year and almost a full calendar year since her arrival in Takodana, and Rey had still made no friends her own age. There were several kids in the immediate neighborhood and her middle school was the largest in the county, but she didn’t know how to make friends. It’s not like she had the opportunity in Jakku. For the first time in her life she was surrounded by a proper peer group and instead of flourishing, she shrank. Like a mushroom habituated to darkness under a rotten log, now exposed to the sun, what was supposed to be energizing was instead annihilating, a step too far, overkill. So she kept to herself, only hanging out with the Solos and Chewie. Who were better than any ‘friend’ anyway. They were...they were her -

“Whoa there!” Han exclaimed suddenly, nudging himself mentally and her physically out of their respective introspections and gesturing to her line. “You got something, Rey.”

Rey gaped at the point of submersion of the once floating bobby. “Crud, you’re right.” She pulled the fishing rod, which had been sitting loosely in her hands, tighter and sure enough she felt the tug transmit like an electric signal through a telegraph wire from the hooked catch to her sweaty palms. _Tug._ Surprised by the strength, she sat forward. “Wh-what do you think it is?” 

“Gungan Trout, maybe?” Chewbacca postulated. “Mon Calamari?”

“Nah,” Han shook his head as Rey struggled to keep the fishing pole in hand. “Something that strong must be a Crolute. Biggest fish in the state, I think. Something of that size at least.”

“What should I do?” she asked.

“Why, reign it in of course!” Han replied. Quickly, hands slippery with sweat, the teen fumbled with the reel handle. “Oh, no!” It was jammed, refusing to budge. She grappled helplessly with her catch, applying the force of her palm to the reel handle like a bicyclist pedaling uphill. Her two companions issued a litany of conflicting advice. “Careful, you might just have to dive in after it!” Han laughed unhelpfully, at the same moment Chewie said “Pull up, use it as a lever!” A combination of alien strength and nerves undermined her grip, eliciting an overcorrection of shirks and jerks. A sense that she had bitten off more than she could chew overwhelmed her and later she could scarcely account for what happened next. But one moment her butt was seated on the rear of the boat - and then it wasn’t.

“Oh-”

The letter formed perfectly and stupidly on her mouth the half second it took to plummet into the lake, providing easy passage for water to trespass. The bright sunniness of the day fell to murky, suffocating night as her impromptu plunge submerged her head to toe. 

Rey hardly ever swore, either in voice or thought, but cuss words kept sounding through her brain while she flailed, trying and failing to establish which side was up. She closed her eyes against the sting of the water and refused to open them to terrifying depths again. What if the thing that had pulled her in was there, waiting for her? Deprived of the guiding light of the sun Rey thrashed, disoriented, wishing she could expel the liquid from her lungs. A foreign limb groped at her and in her panic her childish imagination conjured a grotesque sea creature and with a jerk she fled from it. A split second too late she recognized it for what it was: a helping hand.

Blindly, the frightened girl pushed forward, still uncertain of her orientation, mind reeling faster than her broken fishing rod, when suddenly her noggin bumped up against something hard and unyielding and she tried to swim passed it. The boat! Somehow she had swam _underneath_ the boat! As oxygen faded, despair rose to fill its place. She was going to die here, trapped, and _no I can’t die not here what do I do -_

The water was cold, paralyzed her. Colder than the worst desert nights in Jakku. _Jakku._ A strange surge filled her limbs, causing her to scramble alongside the edges of the boat. Not strength exactly but something more desperate. A new refrain beat: _I have to get back to the surface, I have to get back to the surface_ \- 

( _back to Jakku,_ her heart whispered, _back to them, waiting for her._ ) 

Rey opened her eyes. She could see the wavering lines of the boat as she scrambled along its curve back to light, to air. She broke the surface like a fist shattering a mirror, her gasp the splintering sound of glass shards. She clung to the side, blinking fast and breathing faster, her bearings slow to return. Two sets of warm hands grasped her shoulders, her arms and with a heave she was back on the stern of the boat, staring up at the whitened faces of Han and Chewbacca. 

* * *

  
  


“I’m real sorry -”

“It’s alright,” Rey rushed to object for the thousandth time over the last couple hours. Both Han and Chewie, who had generously allowed her to sit shotgun in penance (nevermind that the seatbelt didn’t work), had spent the car ride home ruefully apologetic at various intervals. “It wasn’t your fault, really!” she reassured them.

Han kept a fretful gaze at the sunset blazened road ahead. “Guess I overestimated your swimming abilities. Should’ve taken it more seriously. My mistake,” he sighed.

Honestly! He made it sound like he had pushed her into the lake for a joke or something. But really, it wasn’t his fault. Rey shook her head, perplexed and amused. Nothing was or could be _Han Solo’_ s fault. Even on the off chance that it was, which Rey had a hard time imagining, it wouldn’t matter. “It’s ok, really,” she reiterated with a reassuring smile. “Maybe I’m just not a swimmer.” 

“You don’t know that,” Chewie interjected. “Han, you must get that pool fixed.” The Solo-Organa pool had been out of commission since spring. By the time Rey and Han first met pool season had largely passed and it wasn’t till recently that the weather dried off enough that she was willing to take a dip. The pseudo-lessons, already hampered by Han’s ineptitude in teaching, were cut short when scum had started to build up and no one knew what to do about it. Han perpetually put off calling a maintenance worker to come fix it. “Leia will lay into you when she finally finds out.”

The smile faded from Rey at the thought of Leia. She had been gone for almost a month and Rey had been looking forward to seeing her again this weekend. Frequent absences were common for both of the Solos, but more so for Leia since she wasn’t “retired” like Han. They had several residences across the country and abroad that served as way stations for whatever affairs they happened to be involved with at the time. Leia would often leave, in fact she had been living more at her Coruscant City home before she met Rey. The trips out of Takodana were irregularly spaced and usually didn’t last for more than a week. But this time she was gone much longer.

Rey shook her head, as if the sadness were water on a dog’s coat and she could shake it off. _No, I can’t be disappointed. Got no right to be. It’s not like...like I’m their kid or anything..._

From his driver’s seat Han side eyed his adjacent occupant, then made a split second decision. “Say, why don’t we get some ice cream before dinner?” he suggested casually, throwing on his blinker and doing a U-turn before pulling off the road into a strip mall. He nodded at the ice cream parlor located smack dab in the middle of the line of shops, and then shot Rey a wink. “My treat, kid. And when we get back to Takodana we’ll give Leia a call. When I talked to her earlier she practically begged me to put you on the line.” 

“What?” Chewie pretended to pout, sticking his furred lip out in mock hurt. “You mean Leia asks about Rey but not about moi?” 

“Ah quite your whining, you know Leia can barely understand you in person, much less over long distance” Han quipped. “ Rey laughed, feeling cheer return and her doubts recede at the newso that Leia _wanted_ to hear as much she did her, and at the prospect of ice cream. “Can I pick any toppings I want?” she asked excitedly. 

“You can pick all the toppings, Rey.” And as Rey whooped, and the three clambered out of the van, Han’s phone sounding with the faint _ping!_ of a text message as they did so, Rey thought to herself that nothing in the world could spoil this happiness, this contentment, this image of a normal life built over months, after an entire life of hoping and waiting. In her most secret heart of hearts, there whispered what she dared not say aloud to herself: the family she always wanted was right here. She wanted to go on like this forever and ever, until she forgot everything else. No needle could prick the bubble gum dream of what she had at the moment, nestled in suburbia with a mom, a pop, a clan of her own.

* * *

**Leia:**

**_Need to talk to you ASAP._ **

**_Its about Ben._ **


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't have the full details of exactly how I want this story to go down or the background so I'm keeping it kind of vague for now. One of you inquired whether this could be classified as a "darkfic". The answer is...yeah sorta?? There's going to be some disturbing, transgressive stuff. If I had to describe this fic with three published books I'd say its a mixture of Lolita, All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood and Daddy's Girl by Janet Inglis. At least, for part of the story anyway. There will be a time skip to Rey as a 19 year old, though Ben will be Kylo Ren by then so the issues in their relationship won't exactly be resolved.
> 
> Sorry for the length and the pacing but this is about the characters after all. Also, still no beta :P so if you see some errors, indulge me please.
> 
> Don't forget to comment, kudos and bookmark!

* * *

The smoke curled like a great snake, the dissipation a lackluster uncoiling for prey that didn’t exist. Ben didn’t smoke or vape very often and when he indulged he saved it for special occasions. Getting fucked up along with the rest of the Knights. Initiation. Having his first blow job.

  
  


Visiting his parents. A very, very special occasion.

  
  


No, “visit” was too trivial a term. _“Take some time away to decide if this is what you really want_ ,” Snoke’s advice echoed in his head. _“Don’t be ashamed, my boy. It’s your choice. Think of it as a rumspringa.”_ Ben expelled an engine’s worth of steam, lying his head against the headrest of the rental car and leaning a still lanky, but rapidly muscle bound arm out the rolled window, pipe in hand. Was this punishment? Had he failed to live up to the Order? Was it because of _that_ time?

  
  


No. No, he had reassured him it wasn’t. Instead he urged him to do this for his own sake. _“It’s your choice.”_ His choice. Not like getting offloaded to school after school or shipped to your uncle or - No, Snoke would never do that to him. That wasn’t what this was. The decision belonged to him, and the realization both scared and warmed him. No one had ever been so generous, no one so willing to put his welfare and nurturing before anything else, than Marcellus Snoke.

  
  


_Gandalf and Dumbledore come to life,_ Ben thought before swiftly kicking himself at the mortifyingly childish comparison. He wasn’t fucking twelve anymore. The young, not quite man, watched the smoke from his pipe drift into the soft summer night and with it any lingering indecision. He took out his phone and dialed an old number, his fingers flying by muscle memory through each digit, despite the long absence from using it.

  
  


Ditched the pipe. Waited as it rang. Too late he considered that she may have changed her personal contact by now, but then the cooly passionate voice he knew his entire life flooded his ear, his blood, his heart. “Hello?” said the person on the other end of the line, with all the understandable caution that came with getting an out of nowhere call from an unknown cell. His contacts were the first thing he ditched when he left.

  
  


“Mom.”

  
  


Silence reigned and for a moment Ben wondered if she had hung up, if he should’ve maybe planned what he was going to say, been a little bit more fancy than just “Mom” but then before he could continue, she rushed on like a dam let loose. “Ben?” she whispered, her tone constricting his heart against his will. “Is that really you?”

  
  


_No, it’s his secret twin brother Ren_ , he wanted to snap, just so he could bypass the funny thing in his throat. Instead he took a hit and on the exhale replied, “Yeah it’s me. Where are you?”

  
  


“Where - what -” Leia sputtered. “Where am _I_ ? Where are _you_ , Ben?!”

  
  


“Never mind that,” he dismissed, already irritated at the direction this was going. “Where are you staying? New York? Paris?”

  
  


“I’m in Coruscant right now. I’m meeting with senate committee colleagues.”

  
  


“Is dad with you?” 

  
  


“No.” A relief then. He didn’t think he could handle both at once yet. “Ben, what are - why are you asking? Are you alright?”

  
  


“Thinking of popping over. I need a place to stay,” he stated simply, as if it hadn’t been an eon of severed communication, as if he hadn’t stormed out of their lives, as if all the lies and accusations were null. But that’s how he wanted it, for this phone call at least. She was gonna try and steer him into talking about what happened, and soon enough she’d be trying to mine his innermost secrets like a fucking therapist. He knew her game and wanted to put it off as long as he could. 

  
  


Another silence followed. He wondered if he should sugar coat it more. Mothers ten times more dedicated to parenting than she had spurned their prodigal sons for less and Ben wouldn’t exactly bank his immortal soul on appealing to Leia Organa’s maternal love. Finally she spoke, and were it not for the telltale soggy tremor characteristic of tear clogged voices, Ben would’ve thought her unaffected. Perhaps she understood that a big boo hoo snot cry of a reunion laden accompanied by a probing interrogation would only turn him off. “Of course you can stay with me,” she replied. “When are you thinking?”

  
  


Only with her answer did Ben realize how tightly he’d been gripping the armrest.

* * *

  
  
  


Momentos scattered throughout the home attested to a past both intimate and remote. Sometimes Rey felt like a paleontologist excavating prehistoric proof of life when she examined the flags from different countries and organizations that adorned the tall walls of the Solo home along with the hubcap of Han’s first race car, or thumbed through books of exotic locales and histories and mechanics that shelved the bookcases, or the souvenirs acquired through a lifetime of adventure.

  
  


But her favorite of all were the pictures. Leia, twenty years younger, walking into the United Nations headquarters during one of her many landmark humanitarian crusades. A grainy photo of a bashful Luke Skywalker smiling behind the scenes of _Star Finder_ as the production crew milled around in the background. Han and a group of old friends modeling with his old race car trophies (the trophies themselves, to Rey’s disappointment, were kept at Han’s home in the French countryside). One time Han dug up an old album of a trip he took to Borneo where he had met Maz for the first time. “So now you know she’s always been that height,” Han had grinned, when he showed her a black and white photograph of the newly acquainted pair on a sandy beach thumbs upping the camera. 

  
  


Rey had asked the story behind each photo everytime she came across one with the excitement of a child anticipating a fairytale, and she listened in rapt enthusiasm as Han and Leia would happily oblige, absorbing every glamorous detail, glamorous no matter how mundane or incomprehensible because it was about _them_ , adding it to her bank of knowledge so that with each new anecdote she heard she became more sure of her sense that she knew them. The most amazing family on the planet: Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa and Han Solo. 

  
  


For all the inquisitiveness, there was one imprint whose traces she didn’t investigate. The evidence of it gleamed back at her through only several photographs among many, in the shape of a pale boy with short black hair, ears too big for his head and eyes that seem to come from neither the mother nor the father nor the uncle. 

  
  


Rey vaguely knew that Leia and Han had a son. Maz had informed her as much when she first told Rey that Han lived in the nearby Chandrila Wood area that their cul-de-sac bordered. She only mentioned that he was grown already and then moved on. She gave it little thought until she began to get to know the couple and started hanging around their house more often. The first image of him she found was a Christmas photo on the mantelpiece.

  
  


Han must’ve taken the photo since it only featured Leia and a little boy. Her rich brown hair was down and she was seated on the carpeted floor, more undone and casual than Rey had ever seen her, her gaze directed lovingly at a boy with crinkled wrapping paper on his lap. A chubby arm extended triumphantly up in the air where he clutched a model airplane. The cheeks of the boy puffed out and Rey could almost hear the pretend engine noises he must have been making as he played. 

  
  


“That’s Ben,” Han had said, when he caught her examining the photograph. “Our son.” Rey was about to apologize for snooping when he gently he took the photo from Rey and gazed at it with a blend of emotions Rey never saw before: love, weariness, nostalgia, pain, frustration. Regret. “I’d say he was about oh, four or five when I took this. He was so thrilled by cars, planes, anything mechanical. A bit like you,” he smiled. “And so cute for his age, don’t you think? Kinda got less so as he got older,” Han chuckled but there was a bleakness to the laugh. 

  
  


At the time, Rey didn’t know what to say. She was intrigued but she could sense this was delicate territory for the older man. Nonetheless an overwhelming pit of curiosity had formed, not just from seeing the image but even before she found it. Her eyes had been drawn to it amongst the crowd of other frames that sat over the large fireplace. “How old is he now?” she had asked. “Uh,” Han scratched the scruff of his neck, placing the frame back in its original spot. “I wanna say twenty-two? Or twenty-three?” 

  
  


“You mean you’re not sure?” Rey gawked, somewhat impolitely. 

  
  


“Yeah well, it’s been a while since we’ve seen each other,” he shrugged like it was a valid explanation. “He doesn’t exactly like to visit us.” 

  
  


“What?” Rey exclaimed in genuine confusion. “Why not?” Han laughed, the same bleakness still evident even as he attempted to sound casual. “I don’t think he feels we’re the best parents, I guess. And maybe we weren’t…” he trailed off, running a weary hand through weary gray hair and gazing into some distance beyond Rey’s reach. “That’s ridiculous,” Rey replied staunchly and Han laughed, ruffling her head fondly. What child wouldn’t kill for parents like Han Solo and Leia Organa? This Ben person must be crazy!

  
  


After that she began to notice more of the boy called Ben around the Solo-Organa home. In the precious few pictures the couple kept of him, although they all managed to migrate to the upstairs study over the year Rey was with them so as to make room for new photos such as her and Leia playing checkers or humorous snapshot Han took of her trying spam for the first time. In the lingering vestiges indicating his childhood residency, like old stickers of space ships or airplanes still stuck to some of the walls or a linen bin of old toys stored in the basement turned billiards room. In the sighs and frowns she sometimes noticed from Leia or Han.

  
  


She gradually learned bits and pieces about him when he came up. Neither Han nor Leia initiated conversation about their son, but the topic would sometimes come up in a roundabout way. They were general, never addressing the precise details of the issues, but she comprehended one thing for certain: Ben Solo caused his parents a lot of pain. And for that the young girl resented him. 

  
  


A portrait began to emerge in her head, one of an ungrateful child who didn’t know how good he had it, who spurned concerned loving parents and an amazing uncle out of pure spite. From what Leia had told her she knew that he started getting into more trouble as he got older. So, a juvenile delinquent too. What kind of person treats real life heroes, much less ones that are their own family, like garbage? Someone not good, that’s who.

  
  


There was another reason too. The reason she now avoided the study altogether, visions of a flesh and blood family, a lived past that had no room for her, the insurmountable deficit between her and him which rose up like a thorn of interference. A reminder of what she was and who she wasn’t: an orphan from Jakku. A nobody. But it didn’t matter. Ben Solo didn’t exist as far as Rey’s world was concerned. And as far as she could tell he didn’t exist for Leia or Han much either, content to dote and nurture her like the daughter they always wanted. 

* * *

  
  
  


The sun poured upon the tarmac of the landing strip so intensely it resembled some wet, slick backed creature whose soaked hide the wheels of the plane could slip right off of. As it were, the touch-down went smooth and he was off the aircraft just as adroitly. 

  
  


Ben blinked at the sky through the plexiglass window. An inverted ocean of ripple less blue that he despised on instinct. Clear blue domain lording over everyone. Sky. Gee, who did that remind him of? He checked his phone for the weather in Takodana, noting that it was quite a bit hotter for early summer than he remembered it being. Probably climate change. The thought, far from bothering him, brought a surge of joyous malice. God what he wouldn’t give to press the accelerator on _that._

  
  


Ben’s excursion to the suburb that had served as one of his primary homes during childhood wasn’t exactly in the itinerary he shared with his mother. The plan that she knew of was to meet in a week’s time in Coruscant at Leia’s apartments. The conversation had been brief. There wasn’t much detail to hash out considering he knew where pretty much all his parent’s residencies were located, having been shuffled to and fro from them most of his life. Though who knows, maybe they’d bought yet another one without him knowing it.

  
  


Either way neither were going to be in Takodana. Ben neglected to find out where Han was and Leia had most likely known better than to bring him up. But knowing the old geezer he’d probably fucked off somewhere to France or Ecuador, maybe even the Ranch where he was yucking it up with Skywalker at this very moment. 

  
  


He hadn’t planned on visiting Takodana, but in considering what he wanted to bring with him to Coruscant Ben dug up an old key to their Chandrila estate that he must’ve held onto through sheer forgetfulness. So an idea hatched: why not take a little detour to one of the old family haunts? Mom hadn’t changed her number so she probably wouldn’t change the locks on a house she rarely came to. Maybe it would help him habituate back to life with _them_ , back with the Ben Solo he felt increasingly distant from but couldn’t let go, a sort of controlled exposure before the deep dive. Or maybe it was just to get away for fun. 

  
  


A dull vibration thrummed in his hand and his heart leapt when he saw the name flash on the screen, answering the phone call with childish eagerness. “Hello, sir?” 

  
  


“My boy,” cooed a cool, ancient voice and Ben preened under the endearment. So much more devoted than “kid”. “So sorry I didn’t get back to you right away, I really should have -”

  
  


“It’s ok,” Ben hastened to assure. And really, it was. A veritable renaissance man with a hand in numerous industries, institutions and so much more (of which only a select few, Ben included, were privy to) Snoke was a busy man despite his retired status, yet he still found time to look out for him. “I only called you a couple of hours ago.” 

  
  


“You’ve decided to heed my advice, I take it?” 

  
  


“Yes, sir. I…”

  
  


“Go on, my boy,” he encouraged. 

  
  


Ben exhaled shakily. “I think you’re right. I do need this. To see them again, in some capacity. I just - I mean -”

  
  


“There’s no need to explain,” Snoke soothed. “It’s not shameful that you should feel so, especially at this time. Your account with them is hardly settled. Doubts, confusion as to one’s path - that is all perfectly normal. You’re unsure of yourself. Well, I’m here to tell you that that’s perfectly alright.”

  
  


Ben blinked in surprise. “Really?” 

  
  


“Yes, of course! Why do you think I gave you this opportunity? Tell me, have you ever heard of _rumspringa_?”

  
  


“No sir, I haven’t.”

  
  


“It’s a tradition among the Amish peoples. At a certain age they let their youngsters leave home for the outside world where they may indulge in the usual vices without regard for tradition should they so desire to. This is seen as the time where a young person can explore whether they want to live on the outside or, if they so choose, rejoin their original community, having known their other options and vented all their pent up wantonness. Think of this as your _rumspringa_. It is only natural that you should want to explore your options.”

  
  


“Oh.” The leaden weight lightened as Ben processed what his mentor was saying. Snoke wasn’t disappointed in him, he understood! Understood that he’d been harboring the same fear, based on experience, cold and scaly, lurking behind every potential decision: that his new mentor would repudiate him the moment he found any impurity. But of course he wouldn’t, he wasn’t Luke Skywalker. “I see…” The rush of relief was so intense that he almost missed what Snoke said next. 

  
  


“Yes, yes. I believe this will be beneficial for you. Give you a chance to find out more about where you come from. After all, a weed must have its roots dug and shorned before something magnificent can grow in its place. But, we must remember to never throw out the soil that birthed it,” Snoke drawled. “The choice is yours. And that is precisely why, for the duration of this little walkabout, you must cease all contact with me or any of my affiliates.”

  
  


Coldness. In the pit of the stomach. On his skin. Anxiety produces epinephrine and adrenaline which makes you sweat which makes you cold. Ben froze. “What?”

  
  


“In the interest of encouraging your autonomy, it’s best that you not have your foot in two worlds, don’t you agree? That way you can really know when you come to a decision.”

  
  


“I - Well, yeah but -” he floundered at the unexpected blow. Go without Snoke’s guidance just when he needed it the most? 

  
  


“Ben,” said Snoke, anchoring him to the moment in a way no one else could. “I am not asking this of you lightly. It is a sacrifice on my part too. You can’t make a meaningful choice if I’m there breathing down your neck or anyone from the Order influencing your decisions, can you?” Out of a scramble of confusion, Ben managed to reply miserably, quietly, “I suppose not.” 

  
  


“There now, you understand,” Snoke crooned in sympathy. “Never forget that you are the most gifted and thoughtful person I’ve ever met in all my life. Your well being means everything to me.” 

  
  


It helped. “Thank you, sir,” he murmured and he meant it. “But how am I to tell you if I should decide?” Over the phone, Ben heard the corners of the wily octogenarian’s mouth curl. When Snoke smiled it was like the creak of a door scraping its way across a sandpaper floor on rusty hinges. “ _We_ will contact _you_.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


“You want anything else? Besides the au dressed potato chips? Or nutella. Or peaches.”

  
  


Rey shook her head, three buns swishing. “No, that’s it.” Han peered at her on the landing of the staircase. “We need to have a talk about your diet when I come back, kid,” he mumbled in mock sternness, causing her to giggle, before saluting her in farewell and leaving for a quick run to Murkhana Supermarket, an errand that he was only running at Rey’s request. She wanted to practice making cookies for when Leia returned from Coruscant. At first she’d hesitated asking Han - cooking of any kind was _not_ his thing and she didn’t want to push him - and so she attempted it her own at Maz’s place. Two things: Maz was often hard at work running her pizzeria so there was no one to supervise her. And second, it turns out she wasn’t very good at cooking. Who knew mechanical knowledge didn’t translate to making food? 

  
  
  


So after coming home and finding the odor of burnt dough, and extracting an embarrassed confession from the thirteen year old, Maz had ordered that Han get off his lazy, retired butt and help her out. It was _his_ wife, after all, that Rey was doing this for.

  
  


Rey yawned. Barely mid afternoon and she already wanted a nap. She knew Han wouldn’t mind. He let her use one of the guest rooms as an impromptu rest stop whenever she pleased. A little shut eye wouldn’t hurt as long as she didn’t rest too long and screw up her sleep cycle. Han would likely take a while, the grocery store seemed a place of interminable confusion to him. “Gluten-free, Rice flour...Whatever happened to having just one type of flour?” he’d gripe. Rey chuckled contentedly at the memory, making her way up to the room with the skylight and large windowsill right behind the head of the bed frame. She curled up there in the sunlight like a cat, dreamily anticipating Leia’s return as she drifted off in her weariness. The senator had been vague about when she’d come back to Takodana but Rey was certain that it would be soon. Someone was coming, she could feel it…

  
  
  
  


The drive over passed in the back of the taxi passed in a semi-blur. The brief conversation with Snoke had disarmed him, playing over and over again in his head. It wasn’t till half way through the ride that he registered any of the passing view of the town he hadn’t stepped foot in since he was sixteen. It looked...the same. Almost coyly so, as if in special mockery just for him. Same, simple Takodana. _What did you expect, Ben?_

  
  
  


He decided, still a half hours away, that as soon as he got to Chandrila Wood he’d crash for a bit. That was already kinda the plan but now he definitely needed to crash. His melatonin was in a crappy sealed baggie of toiletries thrown carelessly into a trunk of paltry accoutrements. They didn’t really work anymore but he was out of Trazodone and didn’t get around to asking Snoke for more before _this_ whole thing happened.

  
  


A nice nap. It’s not like there was anything much to see in Takodana anyway. It formerly served as one of his more frequent living spaces growing up. Come to think of it, it was the location where Threepio had informed him that his parents decided he was going to live with Uncle Luke “for a little while”. Ben quickly turned away from the memory. His mind went back to what Snoke said. Worry gnawed his stomach. This was a punishment, wasn’t it? Every sentence cycled through his head. What else could it be? Perhaps Hux had gotten to him. As soon as the thought popped up in his head he dismissed it. No, someone as puny as that slimy fox could ever sway Snoke, not about him anyway. Ben may be relatively new to the Order but he already sensed his worth. He knew he was special and Hux jealous of that specialness, of the particular fondness Snoke lavished on no one but him. _“You are the most gifted and thoughtful person I’ve ever met in all my life.”_ Snoke told him that when he was first introduced to the Order and he repeated it again in their phone call. 

  
  


_“After all, a weed must have its roots dug and shorned before something magnificent can grow in its place.”_ He’d also said that. “Weeds”...“roots”...“grow”... Ben suddenly straightened. That’s it! This wasn’t a punishment. It was a test of his loyalty _and_ a nudge him to find out more about him, the man whose legacy was kept from him for years! That’s why he encouraged him to go back. Not just to sort out his affairs. But to build his strength. Solidify his resolve.

  
  


Learn about grandfather.

  
  


The revelation made Ben slump, the cold weight in his stomach dissolving. The whole thing left him in even more need of a nap. He may not even need the melatonin now. 

* * *

  
  


Chandrila Wood was a small stretch of protected forest with the home sitting just beyond the southern treeline. At once a veil from the nearest houses and a backyard, Ben had grown up roaming that little forest with relish. He made sure to tip the driver generously when they pulled up to it; he always appreciated men that knew to keep their mouths shut. Got out with his single suitcase and stared at the place he used to call home. Or rather _a_ home. Same comfortable, upper middle class structure of grainy grey stone brick, excessively large for a family of three, same trees crowding about it in bad need of trimming, and the same general mix of coziness and desolation that seemed to, without intention, so capture the essence of his early upbringing. 

  
  


Jesus, he was tired. The key turned the lock as easily as...the right key turning a lock. He’d been right about the locks. A reassuring sign. Not like his parents had much of a reason to come here anymore. He didn’t bother to look around when he entered. Instead he left his suitcase at the foot of the stairs and ascended the steps. 

He half expected his old room to be shut up and boarded. Instead it stood half-open. Haggard and cranky from the rather length drive, still stinging from the ambiguity of Snoke’s words, he looked forward to a long overdue nap. 

  
  


But as he approached his room something strange began to happen – an indefinable atmosphere suddenly befell him, the breath he drew became deep and slow. An altogether dreamy softness, draped in the surety that we often have in dreams, had him reaching one tingling hand forward and pushing the door wide open, beckoned forth by some unknowable impetus.

There, in his old bed, encircled by a pond of sunlight, lay a young girl.

Silence. Not a word. Ben’s ability to speak was arrested. The normal inquiries – “Who are you?” “How did you get in? Get out!” – were entirely displaced. He only felt a nebulous sense of wonder and, somehow, satisfaction. As if pleased with a prize awarded to him after a day’s hard work. When he drew closer indistinct tenderness through which he perceived her sharpened into specific features: curled on her side, concaved by thin shoulders her rounded face pressed into the pillow with the mouth parted just so, that he could hear the delicate aspirate of her breath in rhythm with the slow rise and fall of her ribbed outline under a too large T-shirt. An ocean spray of freckles decorated her warm profile with little baby hairs whispering along her forehead, sugary brown hair pulled back into three buns. A girl more Goldilocks than princess, fast in verboten sleep in Papa Bear’s bed. 

He watched, his heart beat matching the dream slow pace of her breath, with a feeling that time and space had narrowed; light seem to gather around her from the tips of her socked feet up along skinny legs and her folded arms and nestled head, as if trying to suck the little waif back up into the sun, he dared not disturb her –

Wait a minute.

Ben scowled as he caught himself, the tendrilled spell releasing its hold. He was standing here like a fucking idiot while some punk ass intruder slept in his fucking bed in his own fucking home. Without considering it further he shot forward, engulfed the girl’s shoulder in his massive grip, and flung her out of her protective cocoon and onto her back. “Hey! What the fuck you think you’re doing, huh? Huh?” He shook her for good measure.

He expected a scream, maybe a plea for understanding, not an impressively solid punch to the face. “Jesus!” Ben reared back and in the next second was assailed by a rain of pillows, through which, dodging, he glimpsed the little face of the girl scrunched, teeth clenched, as fearful and as determined as cornered prey.

Rey quickly ran out of pillows to throw. She barely had time to take in what stood before her– tall man, very tall, broad in the shoulders, black as night hair, a large beak of a nose, beauty marks, something familiar – before she darted for the door, out into the hall, and making for the stairs.

“Get back here!” her pursuer roared. Rey scurried down the steps, feet working as fast as a tap dancer. She could hear his heavy footsteps behind her, the wild thump thump of her heart joining the sound in a frightening chorus. Han, Han, where was Han? She was almost to the door when a steel band wrapped around her waist and yanked her back into a hard, flat chest.

“No!” She writhed wildly as both her arms were jammed against her sides in a fierce grip.

“Stop it – STOP IT!” the man growled as her struggle intensified. “You tell me what you’re doing here? How the fuck did you get in? Dammit, stop squirming! Calm the fuck down.” He was so big and she was small, it was like struggling against a grizzly bear. Rey writhed maniacally, hoping to at least throw him off balance but he had picked her up, her feet now dangling, leaving her with no leverage. Nor could she bite him, although she dearly wished to, this monster.

“Settle down, Goldilocks, and show me what you’ve stolen.”

“I didn’t steal anything, you giant moof-milker!” she shrilled. For some odd reason the insult seemed to stun the man. Perhaps he was genuinely offended. At any rate he slackened his grip enough that Rey was able to pull one elbow free, jabbing the sharp point into the underside of the man’s chin. She’d been aiming for his face but it was just as well. With a grunt his grip further slackened, enabling her to wrestle free and dart to the front door like a fox to its den but whose passage provided no haven, just more space outside for him to chase her. She flung it open, the hunter hot on her heels and then - 

Miracle! Safety! Coming up the walkway, his grey head down as he fumbled with his keys, the crook of one arm encircled around a brown grocery bag. 

“Han!” she shrieked. At her call he looked up, puzzled and alarmed. “Rey, what -”

He stopped with an expression so peculiar Rey faltered in her tracks. Han was looking past her, at the pursuer behind her who had frozen in place as well. She glanced between them as she skittered toward Han’s protective figure, eventually crowding behind him. The strange guy was looking at Han with a hardened gaze as his fists - large as frying pans and just as hot to the touch, Rey knew - opened and closed and his jaw worked in a strange side to side, as if uncertain how to arrange itself. When Han spoke his voice sounded so faint it alarmed her. “Ben.”

“Dad.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took so long to update :P I'm slow af. I'll try to be quicker next time. 
> 
> Part of the idea for this story is that Ben and Rey (at least initially) also have this sort of weird pseudo sibling rivalry type thing going on, something that is sort of there in canon but never officially acknowledged because it's just taken for granted vis a vie Kylo/Ben being The Villain and Rey being The Heroine, that Ben is unworthy and Rey is. I guess this how I'm trying to work through the fucked up way the sequels more or less make Rey the glorified replacement child at Ben's expense. It's something that even a lot of Reylo fans don't seem to realize so I thought I'd deconstruct it a little. My approach to their relationship is about not taking that for granted.
> 
> No warnings for this chapter.

They sat cross wise from each other at the dining table while Han fussed about the kitchen. “I’m gonna need some whiskey,” he’d mumbled once all three returned to the interior of the house, with the expectant air of explanation hanging between them. Now Rey recognized the young man. She recognized him because she’d glimpsed him often enough as a little boy. Ben Solo. A jumbo sized version of him. One that had undergone the permanent mutations of puberty and into his not quite settled adult form. Rey squeezed her brain to remember his age. Han or Leia or Chewie told her once. 

  
  


Older Ben Solo’s features were sharper, more rivened and they cut a confusing collage in which the traces of his parents seemed lost. He was at once paler and darker than either of them, the milky skin decorated with a splatter of speckles in varying size and offset by a whorl of black hair and shadowy eyes. He was big, taller and broader than Han, but something gangly remained, a tinge of lingering adolescent awkwardness that made him seem smaller and less sure of himself than his father. After examining him for a minute in a mutual sizing up Rey declared, “You look nothing like them.” 

  
  


Ben’s eyes narrowed at the unmistakable note of triumph. He couldn’t account for its basis but he knew she was pleased by the observation. “You look like no one,” he snapped back instinctively. The girl blinked and the smugness vanished. The fine brows drew into a troubled pucker and he knew he hit the target. It almost made him feel bad when he saw her shrink back in hurt. He...he hadn’t meant to wound her that much.

  
  


Before he could inquire why his stab in the dark landed so hard, his father was back in the dining room. A glass of whiskey for himself, ice water for Ben and a frothy cup of sprite for the Goldilocks. “I also got some coffee brewing if you want any,” he offered, sitting across from him next to the girl. So that’s how it was, huh? “I trust you’ve introduced yourselves.” 

  
  


“The fist to the face was all the introduction I needed,” Ben mused. He meant it as a genuine joke but as usual Han took it another way. “Dammit, she didn’t know who you were, Ben. You can’t blame her. I thought your mother said you were going to be staying with her in Coruscant. Why…” he trailed off, as if realizing too late how accusatory he sounded. 

  
  


Ben smiled thinly. Although Rey wasn’t sure it could really be called a smile. It was something nastier. “Why am I here? To see you of course, Dad!” Han’s wary gaze softened and his posture eased as if buoyed by the young man’s words. Rey wasn’t an expert at reading people, but she thought he seemed unusually happy. No, not simply happy. Hopeful.

  
  


Ben dropped his peculiar smile and sighed as he sipped his ice water. “Actually I just thought I’d stop by for a breather before Coruscant. I still had a key with me. Didn’t realize you’d be here.” Rey could practically see the wind escape Han’s sails, his shoulders slouching and expression lapsing back into weariness. She glared daggers at Ben who glared back. Han picked up on the staring contest. “Rey, this is my son Ben. Ben, this is Rey,” he gestured uselessly between them. “She lives with Maz at the moment.”

  
  


Ben had resolved to be aloof for the rest of this interview before bailing to some hotel but the new information surprised him enough that his eyebrows shot up into his hairline. “I didn’t know that crazy old lady had a granddaughter.”

  
  


“Maz isn’t a ‘crazy old lady’!” Rey shrilled, at the same time Han said, “She’s not her granddaughter. She’s serving as Rey’s foster guardian.”

  
  


Rey’s mouth firmed and she dropped her gaze when Ben’s attention flickered over to her. She barely caught it but she thought she saw something dawn in his speckled face that she couldn’t quite pinpoint: a soft thing close to understanding but also strangely...satisfied. Like he had “caught” her after she had literally slipped through his grasp before. “So what, you’re babysitting her?”

  
  


“No. We like hanging out together. Is that so hard to believe?” Han chortled, in a half-assed attempt at humor. “Not at all, actually,” Ben retorted, standing and making a great show of preparation. “Wait - where are you going?” Han asked, alarmed when his son headed toward the front door and gathered up his discarded suitcase and wind breaker. “Think I’ll stay at some hotel,” Ben replied nonchalantly. 

  
  


“What - No wait, Ben!” Han heaved himself out of his chair and after his son who was exiting the front door. Ben was calmly fiddling with his phone, ready to call an Uber, when he almost ran into him. “Ben, there’s no need to leave,” Han said, looking harried just by his short jog, a hand over his heart as he caught his breath. “Stay,” he breathed. 

  
  


Ben hated that he felt a twinge of concern and before he could stymie that weak pathetic part of him that always seemed to boil up no matter how much Snoke attempted to guide him otherwise, he found himself asking his father if he was alright, although it came out as, “What’s wrong with you?” Perhaps the foot-in-mouth tendencies he’d inherited from the old geezer in front of him did come in handy after all.

  
  


Predictably, Han waved him off. “It’s nothing - look, Ben. I know things aren’t -” he struggled to find the words - “ideal right now. But you came out all this way -”

  
  


“What isn’t ‘ideal’?” Ben interrupted. His voice, the voice Han best remembered as belonging to a child, not the young man who stood half a head taller than him, even though he should’ve known him just as well, dammit - his voice was a dark gathering cloud before the storm. “The fact that I showed up to ruin your weird little game of House with your stray orphan? That I didn’t turn out the perfect drone of a son you wanted me to be? Or how about you and mom taking  _ his _ side?” 

  
  


“Son…” Han reached out but thinking twice his hand dropped to his side. Story of his life. Ben Solo, the loose wire. Ben Solo, the powder keg, one touch and its all kaboom. Snoke wasn’t afraid of exploding. He touched and embraced Ben like a proper father. “I can’t change what happened. If I could go back in time and do things differently I would and I’m sure your mother would too. In lieu of that,” Han shrugged, spreading his hands pleadingly, “what I can do in the present is make sure you have a roof over your head.”

  
  


His fists clenched over and over and to stop the tic he reverted to another one, running agitated fingers through his black hair. “Ben, just stay a while. It’s the least I could do.” Without the slightest awareness his father mimicked the motion - or maybe it was Ben who had parodied his father - the anxious sweep of locks by a restless hand but the locks were gray bristles and the hands wrinkled. He recoiled at the image, a reflection through the prism of an hour glass, etched by a variant of him as inescapable as blood. To think, this is what his parents wanted of him, what they expected of him when they dared to look at him: either a monster or some version of themselves. No room for just him.

  
  


He was about to reject his father, cut him to the quick with words when he noticed a little face peeping out from behind the door that Han had left wide open in following him. Rey spied attentively on the father and son and when her slenderly rounded eyes caught his she gazed boldly back. 

  
  


The word slipped from him before he knew it. “Fine.”

* * *

  
  


That evening, Ben Solo proceeded to shut himself up in his old room, speaking to no one, and refusing invitation to join Han and Rey at Kanata Kastle. He never did take the nap though. The bed was saturated with young girl scent. A peachy smell, no doubt from some cheap shampoo in an iridescent bottle splashed with fun, bright colors. The types of products that teenage girls go gah gah over. He marveled at the mark her thin frame had left. He swore he could still see the indent of her body and feel its lingering warmth, like a residual haunting. So he stayed away and he stayed awake.

  
  


Meanwhile Han treated Rey to a somber dinner. Usually obliging, if a bit gruff, the retired racecar driver was unusually quiet that evening, and that was in spite of Maz serving him his favorite cocktail “on the house, dearie.” When he excused himself to use the bathroom, Maz plopped into his chair and asked with a sigh, “So, I take it that not all is well with the Solo family heir?” 

  
  


Rey started, speaking through her margherita pizza. “How did you know?”

  
  


“Pried the info from his cold, dead hands last week when he dropped you off from the lake,” Maz sniffed. Thats probably how she got him to spill, thought Rey. Probably scented out the trouble like a bloodhound. There was little you could hide from Maz, Rey learned that early on. The only mercy was when she  _ let _ things slide. Rey furrowed her brow, stumped, and swallowed her pizza. “But how could Han have told you last week when he just arrived today?”

  
  


Maz had been about to take a sip of her tonic, when she slammed glass down. “You mean Ben Solo is here?! In Takodana?”

  
  


“Well, yeah,” Rey said, bemused. 

  
  


The corner of Maz’s wizened mouth twisted as she stared at her glass. “I’m gonna need a stiffer drink,” she mused then looked up. “I’m sorry, hon, what I meant was Han told me last week that he got a call from Leia saying that their son was going to visit her on Coruscant for the first time in a long time.”

  
  


“Oh.”  _ He didn’t tell me _ . She almost said that but bit her cheese-greased lip just in time. It helped stymie the little wounded jab in the side of her heart that she knew she had no reason, no right to feel. Han didn’t owe her annual updates when something important in his personal life happened. It’s not like he was her father.

  
  


She chomped viciously into another mouthful of pizza and as she chewed she asked, “Maz, what happened between them?”

  
  


Maz pondered the question. “Have you ever heard the name Anakin? How about Vader?” Rey shook her head. “I thought not. Not many do. And I suppose Leia would not be to keen to discuss him. He was Luke and Leia’s father.” Rey thanked god she was not taking a sip of root beer or else she would’ve done a spit take. Instead she choked inelegantly on her pizza. A small exclamation eeked around the food and after a hefty swallow and a couple of coughs, she managed, “Luke and Leia’s father? I thought no one knew who he was.”

  
  


The story was well known enough, despite the Skywalker-Organa secrecy surrounding their private lives. It was one of the many things that helped cement them in stardom. Twins separated from birth; their mother the famed socialite beauty Padma Amidala, the sole child of wealthy financiers, who mysteriously went missing; shows up several years later at the Organa’s doorstep with a daughter in her arms and a dying wish on her lips. Meanwhile Luke had grown up on a farm in Kansas, both him and the world in complete ignorance of his true origins, until twenty three years later when he’d come to find out that one of his best friends and dearest allies was in fact his sister. 

  
  


Why Padme had left one twin with the Organas and the other on a farm with Lars and Beru Skywalker and who the father was would forever remain a mystery. Padme had at least known the Organa family for years but Lars and Beru she had seemingly no connection to and both would perish in a fire before Luke ever learned the truth, taking all possible info with them. It was a tale Rey had always held dear. Maz sighed and took a swig of her concoction. “A long story. Basically Anakin Skywalker led something of a double life. Got involved with some criminal elements. He went by another name in his older age: Darth Vader.” 

  
  


“Dark Vader?” Rey repeated wrinkling her nose at the weird name. “Dar _ th _ Vader, dear, Maz corrected. “A name taken from ancient lore of some kind, I believe. I don’t know a whole lot about the situation but, what I understand, he was a dedicated man who’s very passionate qualities made him dangerous by the time he became Vader. And, I suppose, Ben Solo reminds them of him.”

  
  


A million tangents swarmed for attention in Rey’s head. How much had he been involved in the twins lives? What did he do that was so bad? She could see Han returning from the bathroom so she blurted out the first one that came out. “Wait, which one?” she whispered. Maz quirked a quizzical brow so she elaborated. “Ben. He reminds them of Anakin? Or Vader?”

  
  


Then scolded herself when she realized how dumb the question was. Maz squinted in scrutiny of her. The aged woman glanced back at Han ambling towards them. “I suppose that’s up to you to decide,” she answered ambiguously. “Just...be careful, Rey.” Then she took a shot of her glass to polish off the conversation before making her retreat. “Enjoy your meal, you two,” she winked then muttered to Han as he sat back down, “we’ll talk later.” That at least earned her an owlish glower. 

  
  
  
  


This wasn’t the Stone Age. She could just google it right? Pick up her phone and type in Anakin Skywalker or Darn Vader or Dart Vader or whatever his name was. But somehow Rey couldn’t bring herself to do it anymore than she could ask Han or call Leia or text Chewie about it. Even though they had always been so open, always answered her questions. Stuff about their adventures, their accomplishments, cars, planes,  _ Star Finder _ . They always were eager to talk. Yet Han sitting across from her at dinner, moodily picking at his food might as well have been sitting a thousand miles away he seemed so distant. 

  
  


Rey blamed Ben Solo. 

  
  


No, Rey decided, staring up at the fake stars glowing faintly above her bed as she lay up to her chin in the light sheet that kept her insulated from the minimal chill of the night. She wouldn’t ask them or snoop on the internet to find out such intimate details. Imagine if someone did that to her? Not that there was anything to find. There were three choices then: ask Chewie - no, too close to the source, she thought. Maz? But she said she didn’t know a lot, that left her with...

  
  


Ben Solo. Damn him for popping up again! Rey recoiled at the thought of Han and Leia’s ungrateful manchild of a son, but his image, tall and gangly yet with broad shoulders, persisted, a stain on her retinas that followed her into sleep like a daydream, like a nightmare.

  
  


* * *

  
  


The next day was cookie baking day, or so she thought. “Han, this is cake mix,” she informed him. They both stood in the bright kitchen, the older man fiddling with his phone, sending texts to someone out there. Probably Leia. Curiosity stirred about what they were texting but she didn’t dare ask. It’s just, Han rarely texted. For a man who knew his way around every race car or aircraft like the palm of his hand Han was hopeless with a modern cell phone. 

  
  


He pocketed it before she could take a look and a little dart of, not hurt exactly, but wounded suspicion arose. She bet he was texting about Ben. Who as far as she could tell hadn’t come out of the spare bedroom which she had just learned used to be  _ his _ . “Son of a moof milker,” Han sighed, taking the cake mix from her and examining it with a stumped face. “Does it even make a difference? We’ll just bake her a cake then.”

  
  


Maybe a cake would be easier than cookies since there’d be less of them, Rey reasoned. One big unified structure instead of a bunch of fragmented pieces. Once the cake was loaded, Han turned on the TV and draped himself obligingly on the couch in front of it. “What?” he queried innocently, as Rey pretended to glower at him, looking for all like a farmhand lazing in a hammock after a day out in the field. “Baking is harder than working on an engine and I’m not as young as I used to be.” Rey let the grin overtake her, but feeling restless she decided on meandering around, instead of joining the Solo patriarch in his  _ Scrubs _ reruns viewing. If it wasn’t  _ Star Finder  _ she wasn’t that interested.

  
  


Takodana was famous for its lush woods and lakes and there was no time that their leafy iridescence and ligneous glory was more blindingly on display than in summertime. Chandrila Wood that surrounded much of the Solo-Organa estate was no exception. A desert girl, used to arid dunes and flat stretches of featureless sand trees seemed like tall, but benevolent strangers and though she welcomed the greenery it was still easy for her to get lost when she wasn’t paying attention. It was maybe five minutes into her aimless reverie that she encountered him.

  
  


“Having fun?” The voice startled her and she turned to find Ben Solo, emerging from a copse of trees and tangled bush, taking a drag from a cigarette and watching her through hooded eyes. She hadn’t seen him since yesterday, after he disappeared into the spareroom - his former room, she later learned from Han. “What are you doing here?” she blurted. 

  
  


“Excuse you, I was here first,” he scoffed, exhaling the smoke in a puff like an irritated dragon. He mosied about casually and although he didn’t come closer Rey tensed, following his movements so that her back never faced him. Survival instincts, she told herself, labeling the force that, like natural law, made it impossible to look away from him.

  
  


Whatever it was he seemed caught up in the same force as she, keeping round her, eyes alert on her as if locked into orbit. “Where’s Han?”

  
  


Rey frowned. “You mean your dad?” She thought she saw him twitch. “He’s back at the house. We’re baking a cake for…”

  
  


“ _ My _ mother,” Ben finished, emphasizing the possessive in mockery. “ _ My _ house too, eventually. If they haven’t written me out of the will yet.” She must’ve shown something for his gaze became sharper and he moved closer. Studying her. “You’ll have to wait a long time to give it to her. She’s not coming back for a while. In fact you may as well throw it and any other welcome home presents in the trash.”

  
  


Rey revolted at this. “Han said Leia -“

  
  


“Forget what Han told you,” he snapped, throwing his cigarette away. She stared after it, weirdly afraid it might start a forest fire. She wondered if he would go up in flames too if the spark caught, he was as big as any tree. “I think I know my parents better than you do, Goldilocks.”

  
  


“Don’t call me that,” Rey snapped back.

  
  


“Why not? Seems appropriate to me.” 

  
  


“No, it’s not!” she objected shrilly, feeling an ugliness rising in her. Her up thrusted chin quivered and she hunched her shoulders in to disguise the quaver as her distress mounted. Really, it riled her more than it should. The young man noted it and smirked. “I see. You see yourself more as Little Red Riding Hood and me the Big Bad Wolf. “Well, let me tell you-”

  
  


Suddenly he was near her and her back hit up against a tree trunk. He’d been advancing and she retreating without her noticing, and now Ben Solo stood over her, stooped from his great heights, the trees bent with him, his dark eyes searching hers, arms boxing her in. “ _ You’re _ the trespasser here. Oh yes, don’t think I don’t realize what’s going on here. I see you. So lonely,” he breathed and for a moment he looked less mean. As if he had compassion for her. Unable to take it she looked away. A large hand, radiating warmth hovered near her face but didn’t touch her. A stray hair was tucked behind her ear. “A little orphan who’s probably never known a family, who hates where they’re from and where they’re trapped. At night, you probably imagine a far away island place, some magical sanctuary where all your problems can be answered. Now you probably think you’ve found the island, found  _ them _ .”

  
  


“Shut up,” she whispered, astounded at the truth he spoke. 

  
  


“You think you can just waltz in here and play House?” he scowled. “Wise up. Han will just disappoint you.”

  
  


“That’s not true!”

  
  


“I wonder who’s right,” Ben hummed, putting a finger to his chin in sarcastic thought. “Me, their adult son who’s known them forever? Or you, some stray kid who met them - what? A couple months ago or something?” Rey wondered if this was what it was like to have an older brother. Were they all this mean? But of course they weren’t brother and sister. Far from it. 

  
  


The telltale sting barbed her pupils and ashamed, she fiercely swiped at the tears. At the sniffle that escaped her, Ben softened around the edges, some of the malice leaving him. “There’s no need for that.” She blinked up at him through hazel eyes. Blurred with tears the tremulous brown-green was like looking at the floodplains of a springtime marsh and his breath hitched, his voice gentling further. “Don’t be afraid, Rey. The truth is hard but you can’t run away from it.” 

  
  


Her eyes snapped fire behind the liquid, a switch flipping as she met him head on for the first time. “I’m not the one who’s running away, you did!” she accused. Ben Solo sucked his breath in as they did battle through their shared gaze, her fierce glare beating him back. Now he was less than the trees, just a man, a boy again, no Big Bad Wolf. Suddenly she saw it.

  
  


“ _ You _ ,” she uttered, confused and certain at the same time. “You’re afraid.” At her words, genuine dismay, the type of stunned chastisement someone might have from an unexpected slap, throwing his vulnerability wide open. “You’re afraid you’ll never be as strong as Vader!”

  
  


He reeled back and both shuddered at the separation, like snapping apart a glue that held them together. Their harsh breaths stood in stark contrast to the tranquil forest sounds that rushed to fill the gap between them. Ben’s weak chin wobbled as he stared at her in a mixture of awe and alarm. He didn’t stop her when she rushed past him and back to the house. 

* * *

  
  


Later, when Han and Rey removed the cake from the oven and sampled their creation, they realized they had accidentally used salt instead of sugar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for any weird errors, I want to get this out, so I can move on to the even more angstier stuff.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who's stuck around - sorry for the wait as always. I am a slow writer who gets caught up in the details to my own detriment lol. I hope you like character development because this chapter's got some. Remember this is a slow burn so I'm not exactly jumping into the steamy or dangerous stuff as of yet. While I sorta intended this to be a dark(ish) fic it's kinda coming out more like an angsty soft story. But the warnings still remain, I'm working my way up to them. Can't predict exactly how this will go. 
> 
> Enjoy, comment, kudos and bookmark!

He was about 50/50 on whether he wouldn’t just bail out on a one way trip to Canto Bight so he could promptly wash this sad episode out of his life, when the girl’s smug little face showed up the next morning and made the decision for him. Ben wasn’t going anywhere. By the defiant look on her freckled face, neither was Rey. 

  
  


He couldn’t tell whether Han was relieved or anxious when Ben informed him he was willing to stick around for a while. “It’s not like I got any money for a hotel anyway,” he justified, not wanting his father to get the wrong idea. Not really true, Ben did have money but he rather not answer questions about how and where. Han gave him that half hitch of a smile he used to convey all other emotions that couldn’t fit into a noncommittal sigh or a rolling of the eyes. “I’m glad,” he said, and Ben wasn’t sure how much he believed it. 

  
  


“Hello, Rey” he greeted her when her eyes narrowed upon noticing him lounging in front of the TV. It was the first time he had addressed her by name. He figured he owed it to her. The words replayed to him.  _ “You’re afraid you’ll never be as strong as Vader!” _ How did she…

  
  


She flushed at the way her name rolled off his tongue but all she asked was “Where’s Han?” 

  
  


Ben frowned. “He’s on his laptop. Do you always just walk into other people’s houses? I should call the cops.” Like a child she stuck out her tongue and ran away. He sat there, stunned. But then why should he be? Rey was a  _ child _ after all. Come to think of it, how old was she? She had to be at least ten years younger than him. Girls grow up so much faster...He recalled her from the woods, him backing her into the tree, his big body so close to her small one; how her hair felt stringy between his fingers, emanating the artificial fruity scent of the cheap shampoo that all teenage girls use because they think it’s cute. How flushed her face looked and the butterfly-iridescence of her tears made the marshy hazel pop. And the anger. She had seemed both old and young then. 

  
  


Forcibly he shoved the image down. He was sticking around to prove a point and keep his word to Snoke. Not because he saw something hauntingly familiar in the beautiful eyes of a little girl-woman. 

  
  


She didn’t want to bother Han so she headed down to her favorite area besides the woods. It was large, carpeted and cool and the residue of misuse dusted off months ago. The Solo patriarch had introduced her to the recreational room within the first few times they hung out. He was little more stiff then with her and had let the foosball table, arcade games, a decent flatscreen, attached gym and full grown fridge makeup for the awkward conversations and silences that restricted them. Midway down Rey paused to survey the entirety of the room. 

  
  


_ “Why do you have all this stuff?” _

  
  


_ “For our son. He needed a space of his own. Now that he’s gone I don’t get much use out of it.” _

  
  


Then why was it still there? That’s what she’d wanted to ask him. She knew now that Han was much more sentimental than he let on, his attachment to junk another endearing quality, something they shared to some degree. As she gazed over the domain, a possessive anger filled her. Han and Leia built this for Ben Solo. And he just walked out on it, like an ungrateful brat. 

  
  


The rec room permeated a respite from the early summer heat of above. She padded eagerly toward the flat screen and sat on the floor space in front of the small couch. Selected the game. And played. Rey wasn’t a gamer by any means. Her limited experience came from salvaging an old Xbox console years ago and working it on the sly until Unkar Plutt found out and trashed it beyond repair. “ _ First rule girl,”  _ he growled,

“ _ nothing here belongs to you”.  _

  
  


Nothing belonged to her and she belonged to no one. 

  
  


The minutes passed easily, so easily she didn’t notice when company arrived. “Solo Speed? So outdated.” Rey stifled the instinct to turn to the intruder. She would crash if she did and she knew he knew that. The thud of footsteps traveled the carpet and shimmied up the length of her body like she was a rod receiving electricity. The couch dipped. “Why aren’t you sitting up here?” She didn’t know what to say but she was infuriated that he did. “Don’t you have anything new?” 

  
  


“No.” The word came unwillingly, the silence too loud to stand. 

  
  


“Still a cheap skate, I guess.” She didn’t have a clue what that meant and would’ve let it pass peacefully if he hadn’t continued his commentary. “Always thought this game was a Skyrim rip off.” Rey put down the controller and turned. “What do you want?” she asked tensely. Ben leaned forward and suddenly Rey wished she had sat on the couch, just so he didn’t lord over so completely. He considered her in silence and Rey waited for the jab to land, certain he wanted to start something. She didn’t know what he saw but the twist of his red mouth softened. His face reminded her of origami. “I liked racing games more,” he declared, abruptly getting up and consulting the adjacent shelf that contained different titles, and flashing her one generically called  _ Turbo Speed _ . “I always liked the feeling of freedom it gave me, the clear paths it set out.”

  
  


He seemed entirely genuine and it confounded her. “Han did race car,” she pointed out stupidly. It sounded accusatory, enough to give him pause. “Yes, he did,” he replied, slipping the game back onto the shelf. “Everyone knows Han Solo. ‘The Scoundrel On Wheels’. There’s a shit ton of merch in that vein, I’m pretty sure they even named a videogame after him.” He squinted, pretending to search. “Looks like he doesn’t own it, thank god. I guess even his ego couldn’t stand it. Now, some of my other relatives on the other hand -”

  
  


Rey sprang up, teeth clenched in an alleycat  _ grr _ that would’ve been adorable if Ben took her less seriously. They met each other stare for stare. She knew he wanted her to run away again. The thought was humiliating until she recalled that the last time she did that she had struck an unexpected victory against him. The shaken look he wore came back to her, and the image calmed her a little. It reminded her that he was as mortal as she. With showy deliberation, she sat back down and attempted to resume gameplay. Her eyes flickered to his and far from smug or disdainful he seemed almost...impressed. Intrigued. 

  
  


Her tummy gave a strange whoop and her gaze darted back to the screen where she was attempting to complete a transaction. Maybe...maybe this was an authentic attempt to get to know her - in his own shitty way. From what she ascertained from Leia and Han their son wasn’t exactly graceful in socializing. Or maybe it was just a weird way of testing her. So hard to tell when he was always taking shots at his family. 

  
  


“I guess I like RPGs more.” The statement came out more as a mumble than she would’ve liked and she feared that he would taunt her for her meekness, but he didn’t. “Why?” he asked simply, picking his way back to the couch and settling in beside her. Rey struggled to answer, never having considered it before. “I like the stories,” she replied, tone uncertain. “I like the space that it gives - a completely different world that you can just - drop into.” Her voice got small at the end, unsure if she made sense.”

  
  


“Makes sense,” her pseudo-companion said and she relaxed slightly. “That’s one of the purposes of storytelling. To allow someone to imagine themselves into a narrative that usually has nothing to do with them.” Rey thought about it. “I think it’s the primary reason for stories,” she mused.

  
  


“Hardly,” Ben rejoined, dismissive - at least to her it seemed dismissive. “It’s true,” she pouted, chancing a glare at him. “Stories are for escape and to experience something different -”

  
  


“What about things like  _ The Crucible _ or  _ Nineteen Eigty-Four? _ ” Rey had never heard of those. “People don’t read those to drop themselves into those worlds, nobody wants to be in them. What about things that aren’t pleasant or are tragic like the World Wars?”

  
  


“That’s different,” she grumbled. “That’s history, real events that they teach people so they can learn.” 

  
  


“But it’s still a story, fiction or not. Why do you think historians argue all the time about the atom bomb and have ten million documentaries about the same subject? It’s because the stories of one event can be endless.” His words confused her. He was trying to muddy things, she was sure. “I guess so,” she allowed finally after considering it for a minute. “Yeah.  _ Star Finder  _ is kinda like that.” 

  
  


Ben took a moment to respond. “ _ Star Finder _ , huh? You’re a fan of that show?”

  
  


“I grew up with it!” said Rey perking up in fond remembrance. “‘ _ There are only two things more vast than the universe: one is your imagination. The other is hope’,”  _ she cited, using one of Luke Skywalker’s most famous inspirational quotes from the show.” I mean, who doesn’t know it? Everyone’s seen it and it’s…” The change of atmosphere finally registered. The air felt tight, the young man adjacent to her emitted a heavy silence. Rey peeked at him from the corner of her vision before snapping her eyes back to the screen in alarm. He was gripping the arm of the couch so that his knuckles were white and the fabric groaned, and he was staring straight ahead, his longish jaw grinding back and forth as if trying to loosen it. 

  
  


Unnerved, she babbled on. “I just mean - it’s a little like what you said you know? Um, like how it’s about real stuff but it’s still a story, even though it’s meant to be educational it’s more than that because there’s a narrative and it’s not as if there aren’t other shows about the cosmos but this one has its own - point of view? And, and yeah.”

  
  


“You’re right,” came the rumbled reply, startling her. Against her better judgement, she looked back at Ben again, surprised to find that his quiet rage had faded. He stared at her, searching, interested, with a hint of something like...respect. For some reason she held that look. The deep-settedness of his eyes made them appear more hooded but in a certain light with a certain expression, the light thrown every which way on his rugged-soft face, they appeared large and luminous. A pink heat started in her dimpled cheeks lacing down her neck and chest, a blushed vine on latticework. “That’s exactly right, Rey.”

  
  


The name rolled off so easily, a deep smooth pitch. So different from Han’s gruff voice but not without a certain sharpness that his mother commanded. The sudden reminder of his lineage soured her, and she turned back to the screen. “You’re still wrong, though.”

  
  
  
  
  


Perhaps there was hope after all, Han began thinking. A week and a half after Ben’s arrival and if the tension hadn’t ceased it had certainly changed form. At least he and Ben could share something resembling a neutral conversation, even if it was just a loaded “No, thanks,” when invited to Kanata Kastle or a “Mmm” in response to a timid good morning. Ok, so the conversation stuff still wasn’t going great. Sometimes to fill up the space between them when they were alone, Han would talk about Rey. And Ben listened. And Han noticed that he listened, and that gave him ideas. Maybe that connection was his way in.

  
  


And that connection niggled at both Rey’s and Ben’s awareness all too frequently, even when the knives came out. Maybe that’s why he took Han up on his proposal that weekend, in spite of the potent mistrust. He got a late start that day and when he came down he only to be greeted by the rousing theme of  _ Star Finder  _ the anger that took possession of him sent him rushing toward the room the sounds were coming from. Fucking reruns. Fucking Han leaving the fucking TV on every goddamn minute of the day. If he hustled he could turn the damn thing off before Skywalker’s narration began - 

He thanked the Forces that be that the remote was right there in front of the screen or else he would’ve thrown the monitor. “What the - You snake, I was watching that!” He almost hadn’t noticed her sitting cross legged up on the La-Z boy armchair, glaring at him. “My house, my rules, sweetheart,” he snapped, reverting to the patronizing terms his father used when he and his mother were fighting. Fights they alway thought he couldn’t hear.

  
  


“Don’t call me that. It’s not your house, it’s Han and Leia’s,” Rey corrected. Jesus, were all thirteen year olds this pedantic? “Wrong,” Ben returned. “I inherit this house as soon as I turn thirty or whenever the old man kicks the bucket. And I’m not gonna be sharing it with you when I do.” 

  
  


He thought she’d explode or cry - he gathered already that Rey was a crier, at least around him. Instead her slenderly rounded eyes narrowed. “You threw it all away,” she flung. “You left them and this place.” The insinuation seeped into the air, expelled by her lungs and breathed into his.  _ You’re not worthy _ . 

  
  


To Rey this was just a fact, as clear as black and white. Ben didn’t exert great control over his expressions, but she didn’t expect a flicker of injury to flash in his face, in the trembling twist of his ornate mouth. For a second, she stumbled emotionally, some of the venom leaving her, but then the menace returned to her opponent two-folds, and he advanced upon her with a heavy tread and clenched fists. She tried to get up but he caged her and she shrank to avoid collision. 

  
  


“Skywalker, Organa, Naberrie - these are all names that are in my blood,” he hissed. “What do you know about who I am or where I come from? You turn on the TV and think you know my family, well I bet they haven’t even told you -”

  
  


“I know everything I need to know about you,” she whispered. There was no need to shout with him so close, him so surrounding her, enormous like the arc of the heavens and she a tiny passenger caught in his midsts. Han said that the temperature outside a commercial plane was around  -70° F. Here it felt more like an inferno. Not the striping hot shine of the desert though, photons striking straight through the body, but a moist, fleshy heat, seeping in from some great, palpitating force. The breath of a big animal bearing down her.

  
  


“You don’t,” he replied. She detected a softness in his voice, one that made her gulp and tear up. He was as surprised by her tears as she was. “You can’t have already made up your mind about someone and say that you know them.”

  
  


“You’re one to talk,” she parried, all those horrible things he said in the forest rushing back to her. Ben’s mind seemed to follow hers and he cut her off. “Was I wrong?” he inquired, searching her. Searching her all over. She twisted uncomfortably in his gaze’s maw. About that? No. He had been uncannily right, as if he could see into her mind. That’s the problem. “I’m not just some dumb kid,” she pivoted.

  
  


“I don’t think you are a dumb kid.”

  
  


Oh. “Well, there’s a lot you don’t know about me.” He raised a brow at that. “Rey, no last name. You’re from a backwater town called Niima, smack dab in the Jakku desert. Lived in a junkyard run by some guy named Plutt. You worked for him until a traveler out of town gave a damn and called social services. Maz is your first foster home.” Rey stilled in shock as he recited back her short pitiful biography. “Who told you that?” she demanded, indignant. 

  
  


“Who do you think? Han did.”

  
  


“I did what?” The coil of tension released at the interruption and the two sprang apart. Ben straightened hastily, hand reaching for his hair in a nervous sweep and Rey leaped from the chair. Han examined them, suspicion plain in his features. “You two aren’t fighting again, are you?”

  
  


“No,” they chorused. Han harrumphed, indicating his clear disbelief. “Good because I need a favor to ask. I’m finally getting that nerf-herding pool cleaned and fixed, and I want you two to do some errands together.”

  
  


“What?!”

  
  


“Why together?”

  
  


These were said at the same time. Acting every bit of the adult in the room, Han raised a dignified hand. “We need cleaning supplies and I have other things that I’ve been meaning to get to but I haven’t had the time, so I was hoping you two could handle it while I make some calls. I’ve got a list here...” 

  
  


“‘ _ Haven’t had the time _ ?’” Ben parroted. “You’re a rich retiree, time is all you have.” Rey silently agreed. “Except for lifespan.” Rey took back her agreement. “Ha ha,” his father huffed, and Rey thought she detected a hint of hurt. “I can do it myself,” she offered. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ben sneer and she wanted to kick him. “No can do, kid,” Han tsked, shuffling up the few steps that joined the living room to the open one-walled kitchen. “This requires driving and that means someone who knows how to drive,” he informed her from the depths of the refrigerator. “I  _ do _ know how to drive,” Rey reminded him, stoutly. He emerged clutching the statuesque bottle of his beloved Corellian wine and a carton of juice. “My bad,” he grinned. “I mean it requires someone with a driver’s license, which requires you, Ben.” He nodded toward his son, who didn’t acknowledge the designation except for a measuring stare darting between the wine and his father. “I’ll take the bus,” Rey suggested, exasperated. 

  
  


“No, you won’t. When you’re over here I’ve always promised Maz that I wouldn’t let you wander out on your own. That’s the deal, and I keep my word,” he sniffed imperiously. That was ridiculous, Han let her do things on her own all the time. Only it didn’t happen so often because he was so available. “Besides - Ben you need some good summer clothes too, right? You’ve been wearing the same shirt and shorts since you arrived. And it’s not like you have anything more important to do, right?” The last sentence held a challenge and Ben met it with his best indiscernible canvas despite the near audible gear shift in his black head. Thinking he was going to explode, Rey hastened. “Really, I can just do it by myself -”

  
  


“Alright.” The answer rebounded like a pin in a sonic void. Rey gaped at him and he shrugged. “I do need more T-shirts.”

  
  
  
  
  


“How long is it gonna be this time?”

  
  


Leia sighed over the monitor, looking more her age than ever. “Not sure,” she replied honestly. “I wasn’t expecting this latest development but then again when do I ever do.” That wasn’t really true. Leia was better at anticipating things than her husband was. He always chuckled when he thought of the way she’d boss him and Luke around, especially in their earlier years - better years if he was being honest, he had been more charmed by it then. “It’s for the best actually, how it turned out. That Ben is there with you and I got new hogwash to handle with Congress. I’d hate if this had happened just as he arrived in Coruscant. You know how he is with my work.”

  
  


“I don’t think being here is exactly a reprieve for him either,” Han admitted. 

  
  


“What, you mean he doesn’t like it there? I didn’t tell him where you were and even if he wasn’t anticipating you being in Takodana he had to know there was some chance of you -”

  
  


“I don’t think it’s me for the most part,” Han interrupted. “I think it’s Rey.”

  
  


“That’s ridiculous, how could anyone dislike Rey?” his ex wife puzzled. “She’s such an easy going girl.”  _ Especially when compared to…  _ But no one said that part. His ex-wife’s expression became alarmed. “He’s not being cruel to her, is he?”

  
  
  


“No,” Han rushed, trying to work it out in his mind. “It’s not that, it’s just -” How to explain it? The times they’d been around each other his eyes had been on Rey and hers on his. That Ben listened when he talked about Rey. “He obviously wasn’t expecting it, is all. But I think he likes having her around. You know how he always wanted a sibling. So, who knows,” he shrugged. “Leia, I think she could be a way for us to reconnect with him.”

  
  


Leia looked skeptical. “Maybe. I really wasn’t expecting him to contact me after all this time. I’m glad he did though. I don’t know how much longer I could take it, I would’ve gone searching for him myself. It was like he was entirely off the grid.” 

  
  


Sort of like a criminal running away. Maybe there is too much Vader in him after all. Of course Han didn’t truly believe that but it was concise enough explanation for why Ben is the way he is. It’s what he and Leia had always feared. But maybe that was the problem. They had let fear become the narrator. “Have you talked to him at all about... _ it _ ? Or even just what he’s been doing?” inquired Leia. 

  
  


Han shifted in irritation. “No, of course not. We just got him back, do you think I want to drive him away again?” Why did she really think it was his sole responsibility when it came to these things? Leia bristled. “Well, he’s not gonna talk to me! You’re his father, you can get to him in a way I can’t.” 

  
  


“Oh sorry I can’t be everything, your worshipfulness.” The soft brown eyes, still doeish despite her years, snapped with the all too familiar fire that kindled whenever her passions were enflamed or her ire roused. It was one of the reasons he married her. Now he was less enthusiastic. Ben possessed the same fire as Leia, though she would kill him if he ever said that out loud. “I am not asking you to be everything and you know it, I’m asking you to be a father.” The two glared at each other as if they were still married, like they were still having at it in the living room late at night, surreptitiously furious while Ben slept upstairs or down the hall or wherever they were staying at the time throughout those fractured years. Always the same lines. They were just an excuse to dump it all onto him. 

  
  


The wind went out of him and Han sighed in resignation - though not defeat. He did not want to get into it right now. “Lets just let it go for now. I’ll try when the time is right, ok?” Leia must’ve felt the same weariness if the same tired expression gave any indication. “Fine.”

  
  


Or maybe they should continue arguing because now Han didn’t know what to say. After a stretch of silence, Leia threw him a lifeline. “How’s Rey?” she asked. At the mention the mood eased. This they could talk about - without the guilt, the resentment, the pain. “She’s doing good. Maybe a little confused by the changes but that’s it. You know she wants to bake something for you when you return.” Whenever that was.

  
  
  


“What a sweetie-pie!” Leia exclaimed, brightening considerably at the news. “God, she really is the perfect kid, how could anyone dump her off in the desert?” she tsked. 

  
  
  


“Beats me,” Han agreed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always sorry about any errors. This is unbetaed. I will try to to be speedier with my writing but no guarantees😅 Next chapter: Rey and Ben get deeper into each other's skin, there be stranger danger, and an impromptu stop at a bridal shop👀 Stay tuned.


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